


Money Diaries

by stevieraebarnes



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: Cypher Shift, Jaydick-flashfic: News, M/M, Money Diaries, Secrets, Tumblr: JayDick Flash Fanwork Challenge, batfam
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-06
Updated: 2020-04-06
Packaged: 2021-03-01 20:08:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23502889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stevieraebarnes/pseuds/stevieraebarnes
Summary: Sometimes the bats hold enormous amounts of information about each other. And sometimes they know nothing at all.Welcome to Money Diaries.
Relationships: Dick Grayson/Jason Todd
Comments: 32
Kudos: 188
Collections: Jaydick Flash Fanwork Challenge





	Money Diaries

**Author's Note:**

> Based on the Money Diaries series published by Refinery29.

****

#  ** A Week In The Bowery, On Soft Money **

**REFINERY29** MARCH 2, 2020 10:15 AM

_ Welcome to Money Diaries, where we're tackling the last kind of security in any Gothamite's mind: money. We're asking how the people of Gotham spend their hard-earned (or not) money in a seven-day period — and we're tracking every last dollar. _

_ Today: a born and bred Bowery man earns upward of 200k just this week because, according to the diarist, "that one punk ass finally coughed up the 30% cut of my perfectly legal entrepreneurship." _

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**Occupation:** project manager of a cooperative of sorts.

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**Industry:** shipping and security.

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**Age:** somewhere between 20 and 27, I've been told the work uniform can make me look older.

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**Rent:** I pay for a couple of establishments, but I don't stay there much. $2500/mo total because I have connections and I've already paid large deposits for the properties.

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**Utilities:** I'm hooked directly into the grid. $0.

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**Netflix/Cable:** I've got passwords. I realize I look like a grade A moocher. I don't care.

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**Student Loans:** $0 since I have no formal education.

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**Car payments:** $0. My vehicles are all custom; I built them myself. You think I  _ bought _ a car???

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**Retirement Plan:** to die on the job or live as a fugitive off-world.

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**General Savings:** I don't want Bruce to find out so $0.

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**Related Stories**

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  * A Week In Commuting To Metropolis From Gotham On $120,000 For A Safer Income



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  * A Week In Arkham Asylum On Nothing



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**Day One**

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12:30pm — I wake up after a busy weekend. I worked several shifts, well into the night, but my work pays off because an associate of mine has finally decided to be smart and pay me my dues. There's over $200k in cold cash, stuffed in a paper bag. He said his five year old couldn't spare her superhero lunch box…

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Dick looks up from his phone, his face slack with confusion over what he just read. He sits in the manor's library, on a deceptively comfortable tufted sofa surrounded by shelf-lined walls of books and periodicals. Of all the published words he could come across at this moment, it is an online lifestyle site's digital print of how one, Jason Todd, spends his money. Dick has so many questions to that: why is Jason opening up about his private life to the public? Did he really write this himself? Did he lose a bet to someone, forcing his hand? Is this a cry for help? A desperate communication flung out into the void in the hope that someone will answer?

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In the absence of a divine answer, Alfred enters the quiet retreat with tea for three on his usual silver platter, tea towel draping artfully over one side. He spreads the porcelain set across a sideboard and begins to pour cups for those scattered about the room: Tim on another sofa and Damian on the floor with Alfred the cat. Dick continues to sit there, pondering his questions, even as Alfred presses a warm cup and saucer into his hands—Dick's fingers automatically setting the phone down to receive the warm comfort. But of all that plagues his mind, the only question to come out of Dick's mouth is:

"How the fuck did Jason get featured on _Money Diaries_?"

Alfred the cat manages to snag the wired earbuds Damian has been teasing him with as he looks up at Dick's query, their comfortable silence now dripping with the awkward outburst. Alfred the butler raises an eyebrow at the exclamation before exiting the room. Dick calls out a “Thank you, Alfred,” but it's long too late. Dick promises to feel bad after he figures this out.

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Damian, however, decides chastisement is due now.

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"Grayson, control yourself."

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Across from Dick, Tim sets his own cup down onto an end table—softly and with slow movements—before leaping from his own sofa to Dick's, snatching the unattended phone and unlocking the screen.

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" _Money Diaries_? Really?" Tim scrolls the page, his eyes darting back and forth to absorb the contents. 

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"Just because you  _ can _ unlock someone's phone, doesn't mean you  _should_." 

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Tim continues scrolling, not responding to Dick's comment. "He spends a lot of money on ammo and gift baskets."

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"Yeah. He likes to present some clients with a gift. He says it's sarcastic."

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Tim reads on about the adventures of Jason’s financial purchases. "Oh, he went back to that wholesale armor dealer. Great. Can't wait to be lured into another hug." And then, "He ate a lot of sushi during the week again. He's gonna murder someone if that place ever goes out of business."

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"Honestly Tim, I'm just imagining what your  _ Money Diaries _ would look like and it's terrifying."

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"I'm a gifted vigilante, Dick. You should be terrified."

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Dick purses his mouth at that, lost in thought. They could all be quite terrifying as vigilantes when they needed, when they wanted. But in the end here sat Nightwing, Red Robin, and Robin on elegant furniture, gathered for tea and a visit on this rainy Gotham day.

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The tea parties had begun, like most things in life, by accident.

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It was two months ago that Damian—surly at being left behind by Bruce while he dealt with Justice League work—sat with his back to Dick in the room they were in now, unspeaking and uncooperative in every way. Dick had wanted to spend some time with the kid, but the stubbornness emanating from him proved in making things difficult. Until Alfred turned the gloomy silence into early afternoon tea time, with cookies laid out on a platter. All it took was Dick dipping a cookie for a little too long and the charged atmosphere was broken by the  _ plop! _ of biscuit landing in the cup. Damian instantly forgot his silent strike and berated Dick for not paying enough attention to how long he was letting his biscuit saturate in the hot liquid. They were in  _ the library, Grayson. _

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Dick had tried very hard not to smile.

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After a few more tea times, Tim stumbled upon them in the manor's library and decided to join. They began to unofficially meet on Sundays, when Bruce was out, and they could simply be without judgement. And discuss anything they wanted. Such as Jason’s Money Diary, of all things.

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Tim interrupts Dick’s thoughts. “Wow, this is rather cutesy:  _ ‘The answer to most of my problems is to engage in something I love.’ _ He’s really writing to his audience. Refinery29 eats that shit up.”

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Dick sits stock still on the sofa. “In what context is that presented?”

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“Uhh, it seems to be for self-care? He’s trying to buy something nice, but having a hard time coming up with what. The narrative is kinda weird, actually. And there’s an error code in the text that the site’s editor didn’t catch. That’s embarrassing.”

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Dick settles back into a more comfortable position; what brief increase in tension evaporating quickly while Tim keeps reading on Dick’s phone.

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“Huh. He mentions a Caesar salad, but with a vinaigrette.” Tim looks up from the screen at his older brother. “He hates salad.”

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Dick decides now is the time to snatch his phone back.

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“I was reading that!”

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“It’s my phone.”

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From the floor, Damian adds: “I must say this is a new and creative cry for help from Todd. I suppose nothing is truly beneath him.”

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“Shush, I’m reading.”

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Damian beats a fist against the floor, and the cat takes the opportunity to attack the boy’s hand.

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“He says here that he went to a hardware store to build a table. He specifically says it’s a do-it-yourself table. Why does he need a table? The only safe house of his that can fit a table already has one.”

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“A table,” Tim muses, “table…” He smacks his head. “Vigenère, not vinaigrette! It’s a type of Caesar shift cypher. There's a secret message in here. And the table. He means, build the alphabet table. As in for us to build it.”

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“Don’t forget the weird letters you thought were in error, Tim.” Dick grabs a pencil and pad of paper from one of the library’s many end tables, then begins to scribble. “LVXSWMOOWWVODGQESZKMNA. And the alphabet table.” Dick taps the paper. “We still need a key to uncover what Jay's trying to say.”

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“Tch. Just start moving along the letters until we stumble across a phrase that makes sense. It’s not that hard.”

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“No,” Tim says, “he tells us the key, remember?: _‘the answer to most of my problems is to engage in something I love.’_ What does he love the most? Leather? Armor? Ammo?”

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“Trying to beat Father,” Damian offers.

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Dick moves the pencil along the repeating pattern of 26 letters made up in a grid, already moving forward in the cypher. He stops briefly to jot down one letter at a time as he shifts and substitutes the string of nonsense letters for new ones. Then he puts down the pencil, finished.

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“Oh. Huh.”

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Tim peers over Dick’s shoulder to decode the message and reads:

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_ “Invite me to tea you pricks.” _

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Dick drops the paper and pencil onto Damian’s stomach, the boy still sprawled out in a starfish position on the area rug, and stands up. “He's right. I’m gonna make a call.”

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Tim and Damian watch him leave the room, then turn their attention back to the note.

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“I wonder what the key is.”

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“Infantile. Just work it backwards.”

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“Nah, there’s an equation we can use.”

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Damian sits up and runs the pencil over the alphabet table, conferring with the notepad Dick had written on. “See? Simply retrace Grayson’s steps. There is very little difficulty—”

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The words dry up in Damian’s mouth as he stares at the answer.

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“The key is Grayson himself. Look.”

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Tim leans over and spots the four letters in all capitals. What Jason loves most revealed before them:

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DICK.

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There’s a pause that stretches dangerously too long when the clock on the nearby wall chimes out four times. 

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"Do you think he's referring to Dick or...?" Tim begins.

“Father’s due home soon,” Damian interrupts, his voice quiet yet matter of fact. They do not have time to deliberate. Only act.

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Tim looks around the room and his eyes land on the fireplace. “I think that fire needs stoking, but I’d hate to bother Alfred. He just brought us tea.”

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“Don’t get up, Drake. I’ll attend the fire.”

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Damian jumps up to a standing position, the paper, plus several more sheets from underneath, clutched in his small hand. He makes his way to the hearth and tosses the sheets into the fire. He then grabs an iron poker and gives the logs and papers a few furious prods, ensuring that all goes up in flames.

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It should buy Dick and Jason some time.

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**Author's Note:**

> Unbeta'd and rushed to make the deadline *sobs*
> 
> Thanks for reading :D


End file.
